Pieter Bruegel the Elder: Evolution of his compositional and painting styles

When Pieter Bruegel the Elder visited Italy in the early 1550s, the Mannerist School was in full flower, yet, unlike many of his predecessors, he did not adopt this style in his works. Rather, according to a number of contemporary -- and near-contemporary -- commentators, he reached back into old Flemish painting approaches -- specifically the work of Hieronymus Bosch (c. 1450 - 1516) -- to serve as the foundation of his early painting style.

• In his 1567 work on the history of the Netherlands, the Italian humanist and scholar Lodovico Guicciardini reported on one Pieter Bruegel from Breda who was "a great imitator of of the science and functions of Hieronymus Bosch" so much so that he had been given the epithet of "Second Hieronymus Bosch" (Koster). 
• Vasari confused the timeline of the two artists but described the works of Bosch and Bruegel as (i) landscapes in oil and (ii) fantasies, bizarre things, dreams and imaginations. 
• The humanist Dominicus Lampsonius highlighted Bruegel's gift with pen and design and, in so doing, elevated his drawings over his painterly works. 
• Ortelius, the famed cartographer, acknowledged both the Boschian and naturalism aspects of Bruegel's work; as did Karel van Mander in his biography of the artist.

The Census at Bethlehem, 1566
Pieter Bruegel the Elder

Some understanding of Bosch's style is a prerequisite to understanding Bruegel's style.

Boschian Style
Writing in the New Yorker, Becca Rothfield described Bosch's works thusly:

… Bosch managed to exert an outsized influence on the religious imagery of his day. His fantastic demons, impossible amalgamations of animals, humans, monsters, and household objects had little precedent in earlier devotional art, nor in the somewhat formulaic depiction of heaven and hell that prevailed among his contemporaries. Bosch's hellscapes presented palpable pandemonium, and even his more routine works were enlivened by inventive details: winged fish with an unfriendly expression following Christ across a river; a tottering demon protruding from a funnel.

In addition to the grotesque visual images -- some appropriated from initial and bas-de-page (end-of-page) paintings from medieval illustrated manuals -- Bosch's panels (Koster):

• afforded a bird's eye view;
• provided huge, steep perspectival ground planes teeming with strange figures; and
• were painted in a thin translucent painting style.

Landscape Style Influence
Pieter Coecke van Aelst is noted as Bruegel's teacher but there are no identified influences passed from teacher to pupil. One area of influence, however, may have been in the area of landscapes. As I noted in an earlier post, all of the works completed immediately on Bruegel's return from Italy were landscapes. And he showed himself to be an accomplished landscapist who adhered to Flemish traditions in that area. The father of Flemish landscaping was reputed to be Joachim Patinir (c. 1480 - 1524) and it is quite likely that his principles and practices were conveyed to Bruegel during his apprenticeship with Coecke van Aelst.

Patinir's painting style can be summarized as follows (Wikipedia):

• Immense vistas exhibitiing observation of naturalistic detail 
• Landscape dwarfs figures
• High viewpoint with high horizon
• Consistent and effective color scheme
• Foreground dominated by brownish shades
• Middle ground a bluish green
• Background a pale blue.

Bruegel Painting Style
Rome Period (1552 - 1553)
In the earliest surviving works Bruegel appears as a landscape artist who hews to the traditions of Patinir but also with some influence from Venetian landscape artists. In Landscape of the Alps and Mountain Landscape with a River, both efforts share steep rock outcroppings and high horizons (a la Patinir). Landscape with Christ appearing to the Disciples at the Sea of Tiberias is textbook Patinir with the rock outcroppings and the three-part color scheme: brownish shades in the foreground, bluish-green in the middle, and a pale blue background.

Landscape of the Alps, 1553

Pieter Bruegel the Elder

Mountain Landscape with a River, 1553

Pieter Bruegel the Elder

Landscape with Christ appearing to the Disciples at the Sea of Tiberias, 1553

Pieter Bruegel the Elder

The Antwerp Period (1554 - 1562)
Most of Bruegel's work during his time in Antwerp was devoted to the composition of drawings for printmaking and more than 20 of the 60 drawings produced during this time drew on Boschian visuals; so much so that Big Fishes Eat Small Fishes (1556) was initially ascribed to Bosch (probably an attempt by the publisher to exact a higher price for the piece). In The Seven Deadly Sins (1558) series, "Bruegel achieved a tricky, creative synthesis of Bosch's demonic symbolism with his own personal vision of human folly and depravity." The vice of Pride from the series is displayed in the second image following.

Big Fishes Eat Small Fishes, 1556
Pieter Bruegel the Elder

Pride, 1558
Pieter Bruegel the Elder

Bosch's effect can still be seen in Bruegel's earliest signed and dated painting -- The Fight between Carnival and Lent (1559):

• High-horizoned landscape
• Decorative surface patterning
• Many iconographic details.

But uniquely Brueglian features are beginning to emerge: sensitivity to color (especially the use of bright primary hues) and the rhythmic organization of forms. When viewed with other paintings of this period -- Netherlandish Proverbs (1559) and Children's Games (1560) -- we see multi-figure compositions with crowds loosely dispersed throughout the picture and usually viewed from above.

The Fight between Carnival and Lent, 1559
Pieter Bruegel the Elder

Netherlandish Proverbs, 1559
Pieter Bruegel the Elder

Bruegel's two most Bosch-like paintings are Dulle Griet and Triumph of Death, both completed in 1562, while Tower of Babel (1563) shows a "new panoramic vista of a vast world only distantly related to Bosch's cosmic landscape" and informs most of his subsequent work. This latter work also highlights the artist's attention to detail and the scientific exactness of his representations.

The Triumph of Death, c. 1562
Pieter Brueghel the Elder

Tower of Babel, 1563
Pieter Bruegel the Elder

Brussels Period (1563 - 1569)
Bruegel moved to Brussels after his marriage to Mayken and it is in this period that he produces his best-known paintings.He returned to landscapes in a big way with a six-painting series honoring the labors associated with the months of the year. These paintings (one of which is lost) were beautifully conceived and executed with the included figures subordinated to great lines of the landscape. Return of the Herd is considered one of the most brilliant panels in the series with a sequence of intersecting diagonals illuminating the scope and grandeur of the natural world.

The Return of the Herd, 1565
Pieter Bruegel the Elder

Distinct Italianate influences begin to emerge in the Bruegel's last works. The monumentalization of the figure in Peasant and Bird Nester (1565) has hints of the grandeur of Michelangelo while the diagonal arrangement of the figures in Peasant Wedding Feast (1566 - 67) recalls Venetian composition. These two paintings show a reduction of the number of individuals in the picture when compared to, for example, The Census at Bethlehem (1566).

The Peasant and the Bird Nester, 1568
Pieter Bruegel the Elder

Peasant Wedding Feast, 1566 - 67
Pieter Bruegel the Elder

Van Eyck and the other stars of the Northern Renaissance used a glaze to "glorify" their oil paintings while Bruegel, in The Census at Bethlehem, mixed layers that had not dried completely. This method is called wet on wet and its light effects are not due to transparency but rather an overlay of material and thick impasto brush strokes of color. This method was first introduced by Bosch.

Pieter Bruegel the Elder reached back into the early phases of the Northern Renaissance to leverage  the fantastical works of Hieronymus Bosch and the pioneering landscape works of Joachim Patinir to form the foundation which provided a source of income in his early years and served as a launching pad for the evolution and development of his painting style. The product of his efforts led to widespread recognition and acclaim and, eventually, a noteworthy legacy. I will cover that legacy in my next post.

Bibliography

Joseph Leo Koster, In Love with Multiplicity, New York Review of Books, May 23, 2019.

Nadine M. Orenstein, The Elusive Life of Pieter Bruegel the Elder in Nadine M. Orenstein (ed.), Pieter Bruegel the Elder: Drawings and Prints, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Yale University Press, 2001.

Becca Rothfield, Hieronymus Bosch's Five-Hundredth-Anniversary Homecoming, New Yorker, March 24, 2016.

Martin Royalton-Kisch, Pieter Bruegel as a Draftsman: The Changing Image in Nadine M. Orenstein (ed.), Pieter Bruegel the Elder: Drawings and Prints, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Yale University Press, 2001.

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Pieter Bruegel the Elder: Life Overview

"There has never been a better painter than Bruegel," according to Joseph Leo Koster. "Always flawless in his design and execution, yet different in each of his works, the peerless painter of the low-life genre yet attaining a monumental vision of the whole, a virtuoso in the ways he manipulates paint yet never contrived, he makes his only rivals (Jim van Eyck, Titian, and Velázquez) seem limited, repetitive, or artificial by comparison." According to metmuseum.org, "Bruegel brought a humanizing spirit to traditional subjects and boldly created new ones. He was an astoundingly innovative painter and craftsman" whose "impact was widespread and long lasting."

Pieter Bruegel the Elder

Little is known about Bruegel's birth or early life. One of his early biographers lists his place of birth as Breda while another lists it as a town near Breda named Brueghel. No such town has been located.

His biographers place Bruegel under the tutelage of the Antwerp-based painter Pieter Coecke van Aelst (who died in 1550 and whose younger daughter Mayken would eventually become Bruegel's wife). There is concrete evidence that Bruegel was in Mechelen in 1550 and 1551 in the employ of the artist and art dealer Claude Dorize. Dorize had a contract with the glove makers' guild to paint an altarpiece for emplacement in Saint Rombout Cathedral and had secured the services of Peeter Baltons to paint the main panel and Bruegel to paint the wings in grisaile. Coecke's wife was originally from Mechelen so it is conceivable that she was instrumental in Bruegel getting this commission. He joined the Antwerp painters guild in 1551 after completion of the Mechelen effort (Orenstein).

Bruegel traveled to Italy between 1552 and 1554. He crossed over to the peninsula from Lyon, traveling as far south as Sicily before finally making his way to Rome, where he sojourned for a while. It is hypothesized that he made this journey in the company of two Antwerp artists: the painter and print designer Maarlen de Vos and the sculptor Jacob Jongelinck.

Bruegel's earliest works show that he was an accomplished landscapist prior to embarking on his trip to Italy (Royalton-Kisch). The drawings for River Landscape and Southern Cloister in a Valley are viewed as based on in-situ drawings while the Naval Battle in the Strait of Messina, while showing a later date, is probably also based on drawings made while he was in Sicily. River Landscape and Southern Cloister in a Valley both show extraordinary variety of touch while the former serves up "broad, empty expanses of river and open sky" (Royalton-Kisch).

River Landscape, 1552
Pieter Bruegel the Elder

Southern Cloister in a Valley, engraving, 1552
After Pieter Bruegel the Elder

Wooded Landscape with Mills, 1552
Pieter Bruegel the Elder

Pastoral Landscape, 1552
Pieter Bruegel the Elder

Mountain Landscape with Ridge and Valley, 1552
Pieter Bruegel the Elder

Naval Battle in the Strait of Messina, engraving, 1561
After Peter Bruegel the Elder

In Rome Bruegel met and collaborated with the Croatian miniaturist Giulio Clovio whose estate inventory included a number of works done by the Flemish artist during his sojourn. One of these works was a miniature painted in equal parts by the two artists. The location of the Bruegel works that were in the possession of Clovio are unknown today.

Ripa Grande in Rome, 1552 - 1554
Pieter Bruegel the Elder

In 1554 Bruegel returned to Antwerp and began working with Hieronymus Cock, one of the best-known print publishers in the Antwerp market at that time. His first effort was Landscape with Bears which Cock elaborated and etched as Landscape with the Temptation of Christ.

Landscape with the Temptation of Christ, 1554
After Pieter Bruegel the Elder

In the 1555-56 timeframe, Bruegel developed the designs for the Large Landscapes group of prints, the beginning of a very productive period as a designer of prints. Extending until 1561, this period yielded more than 40 drawings and provided a steady source of income for the young artist. In the same timeframe he completed four paintings:The Parable of the Sower (1557), The Netherlandish Proverbs (1559), The Battle between Carnival and Lent (1559), and The Children's Games (1560)

Bruegel becomes increasingly active as a painter in 1562, producing the bulk of his known paintings between this year and his death in 1569.

He married Mayken in 1563 and moves to Brussels. There is some conjecture as to why a painter coming into his own would move from the financial center (and wealthy patrons) in Antwerp to the seat of government in Brussels but, in the end, it worked out for him. His patrons included:

• Cardinal Antoine Perrenot de Granville
• Nicolas Jongelinck, prominent Antwerp merchant and royal official (owned 16 of Bruegel's works
• Abraham Ortelius, cartographer.

Bruegel died in Brussels in 1561. He was well-known and well-regarded by the elite during his lifetime as demonstrated by the demand for his works. But his recognition was broad-based. He was known through the circulation of his prints as far away as France and Italy during his lifetime and their continuous republishing after his death.

Bruegel did not publish any writings or descriptions of his work that would either assist in their interpretation or provide insight into his religious or political beliefs. The Low Countries were in the midst of a major religious conflagration between the Calvinists and the Catholics, with the Duke of Alva on the hunt for any and all heretics, yet none of this clearly shows through in his works. In the few drawings and prints which can be categorized as religious, his Tower of Babel is more an allegory "of human pride than a representation of the story in Genesis." In New Testament works, he "showed little interest in depicting Christ's life as reported in the Gospels; instead, he favored the parables uttered by Christ."

The Tower of Babel, c. 1563
Pieter Bruegel the Elder

The Parable of the Wise and Foolish Virgins, 1560 - 63
After Pieter Bruegel the Elder

The Parable of the Good Shepherd, 1565
After Pieter Bruegel the Elder

I will examine the evolution of Bruegel's style in my next post.


Bibliography
Joseph Leo Koster, In Love with Multiplicity, New York Review of Books, May 23, 2019.
Nadine M. Orenstein, The Elusive Life of Pieter Bruegel the Elder in Nadine M. Orenstein (ed.), Pieter Bruegel the Elder: Drawings and Prints, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Yale University Press, 2001.
Martin Royalton-Kisch, Pieter Bruegel as a Draftsman: The Changing Image in Nadine M. Orenstein (ed.), Pieter Bruegel the Elder: Drawings and Prints, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Yale University Press, 2001.

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Pieter Bruegel The Elder: Key Influences on a great Northern Renaissance artist

Pieter Bruegel the Elder was unequalled as a painter during the latter portions of the Northern Renaissance.

... the 16th-century Flemish painter, draughtsman, and printmaker became known as the "peasant Bruegel" because of his extensive focus on the life of the ordinary people ... Wonderfully inventive, Bruegel gained particular esteem for his images of daily life and naturalistic landscapes. His influence on other painters of the Dutch Golden Age, as well as among later artists, was profound.

In this post I explore the key influences which informed the efforts of this artist.

Travel to Italy
While his trip to Italy did not result in the production of works in the classic style, it informed his landscape painting. There is some discussion as to whether Bruegel traveled overland through the Alps on his outward journey or whether he traveled to Rome via boat from Marseilles and then traversed the Alps on his return journey. Regardless of the details, the Alps made an indelible impression on Bruegel. As shown below, his earliest surviving works consist almost exclusively of landscape drawings.

Mountain Landscape with a River, 1553
Pieter Breugel The Elder

Landscape of the Alps, 1553
Pieter Breugel The Elder

Alpine Landscape, c. 1555 - c. 1556
Pieter Breugel The Elder

According to one source, his "... encounter with vast, mountainous landscapes was a seemingly inexhaustible source from which he drew inspiration for the rest of his career."

Hieronymus Bosch
Hieronymus Bosch (1474 - 1516) was "one of the most enigmatic artists of his epoch."  Bosch was born in the town of s'Hertogensbosch and is famous for the fantastic and disturbing details of his panel pictures, works which bring to mind modern-era surrealists. His most famous work is the Garden of Earthly Delights.

The Garden of Early Delights, 1490 - 1510
Hieronymus Bosch

During Bosch's lifetime, he was "widely revered and imitated by his students and followers." And Bruegel was no exception. His Big Fish Eat Little Fish does have a Boschian look and feel and, as a matter of fact, the engraver Pieter Van Der Hayden made a copy of this painting and named it as being from Bosch (who had died in 1516).

Big Fish Eat Little Fish, 1557
Engraving, after Pieter Bruegel

Bosch's The Last Judgment and Bruegel's The Fall of the Rebel Angels both draw on a surrealist strain to convey their messages.

The Last Judgment, c. 1482
Hieronymus Bosch

The Fall of the Rebel Angels, 1562
Pieter Bruegel The Elder

The Reformation
The Reformation had expanded steadily through the Low Countries from its initial beachhead in the Walloon province to the south. As the foothold solidified, artists in protestant areas painted fewer religious subjects, whether through personal conviction, or market demand, or both.

This new dynamic also resulted in a shift in non-religious style wherein large images from classic mythology were replaced by images portraying things at hand. The tradition of landscape and genre painting -- styles that would truly flourish in the upcoming century -- got their starts here. An example of this new direction was Pieter Bruegel's The Wedding Feast which has no historical, religious, or classic tones; rather, it reproduces a normal occurrence in the life of the Flemish peasantry.

The Wedding Feast, 1567

Pieter Bruegel The Elder

Pieter Coecke van Aelst
Pieter Coecke van Aelst was purported to be Pieter Bruegel's master (Bruegel eventually married Coecke's younger daughter Mayken) but it is very difficult to clearly elucidate the impact that he had on Bruegel beyond potentially encouraging him to make the trip to Italy. Pieter Coecke had made the trip to Rome and, on his return, his works reflected the classic style; so much so that I included him in my list of Romanist painters. Bruegel, even though he made the trip to Rome, did not reflect the Romanist style in his works.

Antwerp Humanists
It is widely held that Bruegel interacted with Antwerp humanists -- especially the cartographer Abraham Ortelius and the publisher Christopher Plantin -- and that thse relationships informed his work.

Waterschoot points out that Antwerp, given its focus on business, was not a perfect environment for humanists. Because of the efficiency of Antwerp printers, though, "there was a constant coming and going of distinguished men of learning."

In the second half of the 16th century, Plantin's offices developed into a humanist center and, together with his good friend, the cartographer Abraham Ortelius, he formed a nucleus "on which men like Justus Lipsuis, Joris Hoefnagel, Frans Hogenberg, and Gerard Mercator could rely on for their Antwerp affairs."

Plantin is known to have traded in Bruegel prints and maintained a close relationship with Hieronymous Cock, the primary publisher of Bruegel's prints. Ortelius, who became the leader of the Antwerp Learned Society upon Plantin's death, penned a moving epitaph to Bruegel in his Friendship Album wherein he referred to the artist as his friend.

There are dissenting voices as regards any relationship between Bruegel and the humanists. For example (Marissa Anne Bass):

And I cannot refrain from voicing my skepticism about Bruegel's presumed close association with contemporary humanists ... Ortelius's ownership of Bruegel's grisaille Death of the Virgin and his posthumous praise do not themselves affirm a close friendship between the two men, let alone an exchange of ideas between like minds.

Patrons
Bruegel's paintings were owned by members of Antwerps's professional merchant class and were most often displayed in private social rooms. These complex panels would probably have functioned as conversation pieces and the focus for debate during conversation among like-minded people.

Five of Bruegel's works were in the inventory of Jean Noirot, a former master of the Antwerp Mint, 12 in the inventory of the banker Niclaes Cornelius Cheras, and 16 in the possession of businessman Nicolas Jonglelind. Given the need for conversation pieces, and the amount of spend, it is inconceivable to think that these patrons did not exert influence Bruegel's efforts. The Bruegel self-portrait below would seem to bear that assertion out as the patron looks over his shoulder during the construct of a painting.

The Painter and The Connoisseur, c. 1565
Pieter Bruegel The Elder

In subsequent posts I will spend more time on Bruegel's works and his legacy.

Bibliography
Marissa Ann Bass, Book Review: Stephanie Porras, Pieter Bruegel's Historical Imagination, University Park, Penn State University Press, 2016
Amy Orock, "Homo ludens: Pieter Bruegel's Games and the Humanist Education," Journal of Historians of Netherlandish Art 4:2 (Summer 2012)
Werner Waterschoot, 16th Century Antwerp, a Cultural Capital, www,tyndale.org.


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The split of the Low Countries into the Spanish Netherlands and the United Republic

Religious discontent and economic hardship had led to the Iconoclastic Riots and the Spanish response. Philip II dispatched the Duke of Alva to the Low Countries with "unlimited power for extirpation of heretics." Soon after his arrival, he had the Counts Hoorne and Egmont executed, causing great consternation across the board. He established a tribunal, locally called the Court of Blood (or the court of Troubles) to "try all persons who had been engaged in the late commotions."

Duke of Alva

In Alva's "reign of terror," nobles were rounded up and sent before the Council; they were released upon signing a form of submission. Eighty of Brussels leading citizens were executed in January of 1568 and the terror continued through 1573 with 9000 inhabitants condemned by the Council and 1000 either executed or exiled. In addition to the toll that this terror took on the populace, Alva sought to increase taxes without the consent of the ruling elite, further alienating the inhabitants.

By this time William I, Prince of Orange, who had fled to Nassau upon hearing that Alva would be coming to the Low Countries, had emerged as the focal point of the resistance to the Spanish.

William I, Prince of Orange

Developments in the struggle between the years 1568 and 1586 are illustrated in the chart below. I will provide additional detail on a few of the salient events.

Spain was over-extended in 1576 and had not paid its soldiers. These soldiers mutinied, visiting their wrath on the Low Country inhabitants. This state of affairs resulted in the provinces from the north and south getting together to seek a solution. The supporters of William and the Catholic Loyalists met in Ghent in October, 1576. The Spanish Loyalists agreed to suspend the heresy laws and a compact -- The Pacification of Ghent -- was drawn up and ratified quickly after a second mutiny in which 8000 inhabitants were killed.

At that time Philip appointed his half-brother Don Juan of Austria to replace the dead Requessens. Don Juan was charged with forging a temporary settlement with the rebels.

The cooperation between the Loyalists and William supporters did not hold, however; even with assistance from England and France. William was untrusting of Don Juan while the Loyalists were very open to his advances. Eventually the northern provinces formed the Union of Utrecht while the southern provinces of Hainault and Artois formed the Union of Arras. These two provinces, plus the late-joining Walloon, plus the provinces already under Spanish control, remained loyal to Philip II.

The United Provinces then began casting about for a ruler. They offered the position to the Duke of Anjou but he proved unsatisfactory and returned to France in 1583.

Upon the assassination of William of Orange, Queen Elizabeth I of England sent Robert Dudley, First Earl of Leicester, to aid the United Provinces. The leaders of the United Provinces appointed Dudley Governor-General with the implication that Queen Elizabeth would become their sovereign. Dudley communicated this offer to the Queen and, after failing to receive a timely response, accepted the position. The queen was livid and sent one of her aides with a letter which was to be read to the States-General, in the presence of Dudley, declining the offer.

The Duke of Parma saw William's assassination as an opportunity to retake territory. On the 17th of August, 1585, he accepted the capitulation of Antwerp, "the most important Calvinist bastion of the revolt of the Netherlands." This capitulation signaled the effective partition of the Low Countries:

• The rebellious provinces remained behind the natural barriers of the rivers Scheldt, Meuse, and Rhine
• The Spanish stood a good chance of making further inroads but they were caught up in issues like the Spanish Armada and, thus, took their eye off this ball.

After the reconquest of the southern Netherlands, the Calvinist section of the population was given the option of submitting to Spain and Rome again or leaving the territory. The time for deportation differed from town to town. For example, it was four years in the case of Antwerp and that town saw its population fall from over 100,000 to less than 50,000 after 1585. This was an economic disaster for the town as most of those who left were influential merchants, industrialists and skilled artisans. These emigrees went to the north, the Pfalz region of Germany, and England.

After William's assassination, the United Provinces declared themselves a republic. The form of government was a confederation within which each province remained independent but they were all governed by a Stadtholder responsible for the common defense and a pensioner responsible for foreign affairs.

The Stadtholder position was offered to Maurice of Nassau, the second son of William of Orange. Maurice was a master of siege warfare and showed that prowess by capturing eight towns between 1590 and 1597. He also defeated the Spanish convincingly in two open-field battles -- Tournhont (1597) and Nieuwpoort (1600) -- the first of which cleared the territories of foreign troops and the latter securing the border.

Maurice of Nassau

On the religious front the Reformed Church was officially recognized as was individual religious freedom. The main religion was Calvinism.

As the turn of the century approached, there were leadership changes of the Spanish side of the border: the Duke of Parma died in France in 1592 and was replaced by Archduke Albert in 1596.

These 17 provinces, melded together by actions of the Dukes of Burgundy and the Habsburgs, were now in the throes of what would turn out to be an 80-year war of independence. I will pick up on the 17th-century aspects of that war, and how it shaped the Spanish Netherlands and the Dutch Republic, in subsequent posts.


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Romanists in the Northern Renaissance

The Renaissance art movement in the Low Countries began with van Eyck and the Early Netherlandish (Flemish Primitives) movement and stretched through the end of the century. Within this broader Northern Renaissance there are a number of strains (Early Netherlandish, Antwerp Mannerists, etc.) and schools (Antwerp School, Haarlem School, Leyden School, etc.). I have explored the Early Netherlandish and Antwerp Mannerist strains to date and, in this post, will cover the Romanist strain.

Romanists (Romanism) refers to Low Country artists who, at some point in their career, visited Rome, studied the works of the Italian masters, and, upon their return, incorporated those learnings into their painterly works. This Italianate influence was reflected in a greater emphasis on human form, the addition of classical myths and legends to the artist's repertoire, and inclusion of classic Roman architecture in the painted scene. The works of these artists were primarily religious and mythological and included anatomically correct human beings in contrived poses.

The chart below shows the artists who are known to have travelled to Rome during the first half of the 16th-century (It should be noted that Bernard van Orly, even though he painted in this style, did not ever actually travel to Rome.).

The first Low Country artist to make the trek over the Alps was Jan Gossaert. His patron at the time was Philip of Burgundy and Gossaert traveled as a part of his entourage on a diplomatic trip to Rome. While there Gossaert recorded antique monuments for the art-loving Prince.

The Adoration of the Kings (shown below) is a Gossaert painting in the traditional Early Netherlandish style.

The Adoration of the Kings, 1510 - 1515
Jan Gossaert

It stands in sharp contrast to the first work which reflected his Renaissance learnings -- Neptune and Amphitrite, painted in 1516. These "startlingly large" human representations were the first nudes in the history of Flemish art. The elongation of the figures brings to mind the Gooseneck Madonna of Mannerist fame. In addition to the mythological theme and the nude bodies, the architecture is also drawn from the classic world. Amphitrite's left hand is in a fairly awkward position in this effort.

Neptune and Amphitrite, 1516
Jan Mossaert

His Hercules and Deianira, while exhibiting lower-mass nudes, similarly places them in fairly awkward poses with the intertwining of legs and the relative squareness of Hercules torso vis a vis his lower body.

Hercules and Deianira, 1517
Jan Gossaert

Examples of other Romanist works are shown below. In the case of the van Jeemskerck paintings, the first was painted prior to his trip to Rome, and the second after his return.

The Dying Cleopatra, c. 1522
Jan van Scorel

Saint Luke Painting the Virgin, 1532
Maarten van Heemskerck

Saint Luke Painting the Virgin, 1538 - 40
Maarten van Heemskerck

Original Sin, ?
Michiel Coxcie

Altarpiece of Saints Thomas and Matthias, 1510 - 1520
Bernard van Orley

There was renewed Low-Countries-artist interest in Rome during the last third of the century, driven primarily by the Italian-originated Mannerist movement. Painters who traveled to Rome during that period include Dirck Barandsz, Adriaen de Weerdt, Hans Speckaert, Bartholamäus Spranger, Hendrik Goltzus, and Joachim Wteweel. I will cover this Northern Mannerist movement in a subsequent post.


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The Leyden School, 1500 - 1535: The second phase of the flowering of Dutch art

The first phase of the flowering of Dutch art occurred during the last third of the 15th century, was centered in the city of Haarlem, and was evidenced by the work of artists such as Dirk Bouts, Albert van Ouwater, and Geertgen tot Sint Jans, among others. This school was somewhat disaggregated, with the links between participants difficult to establish. Not so for the Leyden School.

The Leyden School refers to artists who painted in that town during the first third of the 16th-century and included such luminaries as Cornelis Engelbrechts and Lucas van Leyden. Unlike the situation with the Haarlem School, we know that Engelbrechts established a workshop in the city and trained a number of students -- including the aforementioned Lucas van Leyden. We can also identify the work of the school based on similarity of technique in the works of a number of its members.

Abbie Vandivere (Energetic and Skillful Techniques of the Sixteenth-Century Leiden School, Journal of Historians of Netherlandish Art 4:1 (Winter 2012)) observes that "if several painters work in the same milieu, have access to a similar range of material, and are taught within the same workshop, they will logically share certain techniques." The techniques of the artists of the Leyden School, she said, "have many similarities but diverge in individual ways."

Abbie was able to arrive at these conclusions because the Stedelijk Museum de Lakenhal in Leyden and the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, between them, have enough paintings from the region to provide an overview of the Leyden artistic production between 1500 and 1535. Detailed studies of a subset of the Leyden School paintings allowed conservators to arrive at the techniques-conclusions included herein.

The father of the school appears to be Cornelis Engebrechtsz (1465 - 1527), the first important painter from Leyden and master of a large, prolific workshop. He trained many important painters, to include Lucas van Leyden (1494 - 1533), Aertgen van Leyden (1488 - 1564) and his son Peter Cornelisz Kunst (Lucas van Leyden went on to become better known for his prints and engravings, in addition to being a well-regarded painter. Peter Connelisz founded a workshop that eventually surpassed his father's in size.).

When the Mannerist style made its way to Leyden from Antwerp, he incorporated some elements of this school into his own style: "Exaggerated emotionalism and monumental compositions populated by small, slender figures in pronounced contrapposto poses characterized Engebrechtsz's mature Mannerist style" (gettymuseum.org).

Two of his most significant works are altarpieces: The Lamentation (c. 1508) and Crucifixion (c. 1515 - 1518)

The Lamentation, c. 1508
Cornelis Engelbrechtsz

The Crucifixion, c. 1515 - 1518

Cornelisz Engebrechtsz

Source: settemuse.it

Technique
The traditional technique of early Netherlandish painters revolved around superimposed layers and transparent glazes applied directly over the primer or on top of opaque, light-colored underlayers (Vandivere). The painting technique of the Leyden School is comparable to this approach in many ways but, in many cases, they seem to have modified this technique. And the innovations were passed from master to student in a workshop and on to other painters in the area.

School-unique features emerge upon closer inspection: "Sixteenth-century Leiden School painters exploited the properties of the traditional medium. The transparency, fluidity, ease of handling, and slow drying of linseed oil allowed them to" (Vandivere):

• have the underdrawing show through glazes -- all of the artists laid out the painting's composition with underdrawing (included contour lines as well as areas of shadow indicated by hatching or cross-hatching) and then applied the desired color in a single layer over the underdrawing. The underdrawing thus replaces the function of dark paint.
• apply a thin translucent layer between the primer and paint layers -- used either to (i) seal the underdrawing to prevent smearing during painting or (ii) isolate the primer such that it is prevented from absorbing oil medium from the paint layers.
• layer opaque paint and glazes -- expanded the range of tones that the painter could achieve.
• use blotting as a means of providing surface effects -- organic glazes can be viscous and difficult to handle with a brush. Painters could use fingers, blotting, etc., to move this glaze around. In the case of the Leyden School, no attempt is made to conceal these blotting efforts, raising the question as to whether they sought to exploit the tippled surface texture.

Other Schools
The Haarlem School continued into this period with painters such as Jan Mostaert and Jan Joest plying their trade in the city. Mostaert is generally associated with Romanist work during the Northern Renaissance so it will be interesting to determine the depth of that school's penetration in Dutch painting when I examine Romanists and Mannerists.

Wilhelm Valentiner posits that the Amsterdam and Utrecht Schools are direct outgrowths of the Haarlem School.


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